


The Ted Mosby Connection

by galfridian



Category: Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-06-25
Updated: 2009-06-25
Packaged: 2017-11-01 16:27:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/358905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/galfridian/pseuds/galfridian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Missy Cooper has an epiphany, moves to New York, and ends up in an introductory architecture class.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Ted Mosby Connection

**Author's Note:**

> (1) This story has not been beta read, all mistakes her mine; (2) this is my first attempt at writing the characters from How I Met Your Mother; (3) this story is dedicated to [](http://fujiidom.livejournal.com/profile)[**fujiidom**](http://fujiidom.livejournal.com/), for her twenty-first birthday. She loved the idea of Ted/Missy as much as I did, and I decided to give it to her as a birthday gift. The interaction between Marshall and Sheldon was written specifically for her as well. Happy (Belated) Birthday, Maura!

Missy Cooper has an epiphany on her twenty-fifth birthday: Her life sucks a little. She thinks about her twin, no doubt conned by Penny into celebrating his birthday, living a life entirely separate of her. Sheldon, who loathes change even though his abnormalities (her favorite term for his genius) introduced more chaos to his childhood than if he had been just-above-average like her, lives far from them now. But Missy, who eagerly anticipated all the milestones awaiting her in life, is in Texas. Working at a Fuddruckers. With no plans.

It's definitely lame. She definitely hates it.

So she applies to schools on the coasts, Washington, Oregon, California, Florida, New York. She's accepted to two, one in California and one in New York. The old instinct for sibling rivalry kicks in and she thinks that California's probably not big enough for both the Cooper twins.

Anyway, she likes New York City. She spent St. Patrick's Day there once with a couple of friends. It rained most of the time she was there, and lost her bright yellow umbrella at a bar, but the trip endeared the City to her.

Missy chooses to major in design, specifically interior. She appreciates that she can take courses on something she already likes, and that she can potentially be paid to make things pretty. It reminds her of the summer before Sheldon's accelerated education began, when their family took a cross-country vacation. Their parents gave them each a disposable camera so that they could catalogue their favorite parts of the trip for the photo album their mother would put together. Sheldon tossed his aside immediately, but Missy filled both her camera and his with pictures of buildings. At first, her mother couldn't understand why Missy couldn't have taken pictures of Disney World or the Grand Canyon, but at the end of the summer, she presented her with a scrapbook of all the pictures she took.

Missy brings it with her to New York.

She discovers her major is dominated by women, including its professors, and most of the men are less interested in the opposite sex than Sheldon, and that's saying something. Missy considers it an opportunity. In classes filled with men, taught by men, she knows she's likely to lose herself in chasing one or two. It's a habit, a bad one, and she wants to abandon it like she abandoned her low-income, low-expectancy life in Texas.

But then there's Ted Mosby.

 

 

Missy likes Professor Mosby. She think it's adorable how obvious it is that it's his first year teaching, because he sometimes stumbles through things, and his assignments are generic, and he's trying really hard, but he's also distracted easily if people bring up things like Superman or the bar that he and his friends frequent.

Professor Mosby's an architect who left his job at a firm to create his own and failed miserably. He's open about his successes and failures, and Missy likes it, because many of her professors are pretentious. This class is the only one she's likely to have with him, an introductory course to the field because his field and her field overlap, and she thinks that's probably a good thing. She thinks she maybe likes Ted Mosby too much.

There's one other thing that she likes—too much—about Professor Mosby: He cares. She does well in his class, better than maybe one or two of the others, and he wonders what she's doing studying interior design when she could design whole buildings. She tells him about her vacation with her family and her scrapbook, about how she took the pictures because the buildings were cool, but her favorite thing to do was look at photos and imagine what the inside looked like.

One day she brings the scrapbook to class. It's an impulse, one she feels silly for, and she tries to escape after class without talking to him. But the scrapbook is too big for the messenger bag she carries, and Professor Mosby stops her on her way. “Is this it?” He asks, holding his hands out for it. She feels herself blushing—and reprimands herself for it, because like her brother, she does not blush—and hands it over to him.

 They sit in his office for two hours, leafing through the photos. He recognizes most of the buildings, and he can tell her the history of many of them. “Miss Cooper, you were eight when you took these pictures. I can tell you that the architecture world will hurt for not having you.”

“Missy,” she corrects. “A person can appreciate art without creating it. I know my limitations, and I know that some fancy math goes into architecture. My brother got all of the genius genes while we were in the womb. I'm okay with that. I got all the other genes.” Missy thinks of the drawings she's seen of his designs. “Anyway, the architecture world has you.”

“Right now, I don't think it would consider that a great compliment.”

“It will. Just call me when it does. You create the outside, Professor Mosby, and I'll create the inside.”

“Ted,” he says, offering his hand to shake. “You have a deal.”

She shakes his hand.

Oh, yes.

She likes Ted Mosby too much.

 

 

The domination of her chosen major by women has a second advantage, an instant social circle. Several of the other women have come to New York specifically to study design. Missy isn't particularly close to any of them, could probably take or leave them any take of the week, but they're fun and they give her something to do on weekends.

It works well for her, up until the night that her friends decide to find the bar hot-Professor-Mosby and his friends like.

Missy hopes against reason that Ted and his friends are elsewhere that night, but her hopes are in vain. She sees him immediately, sitting across from a brunette woman. The woman is beautiful, and it's obvious that she and Ted are close. Despite her best efforts to not care, Missy feels her heart sink a little.

She orders a drink while her friends find a table near the booth Ted is sitting at. While she waits for her beer, Missy wonders if Sheldon and friends would help her cover up the triple homicide she may have to commit tonight; she's considering methods when a couple enters the bar, having an intense discussion about whether the Loch Ness monster is a girl or a boy. She watches as they join Ted and the brunette at the booth, forcing Ted to switch seats so that he sits next to the brunette.

Well, it's no surprise, Missy thinks as joins her friends, and it's not like it should matter that—

—a man in an exquisitely tailored suit bumps into her. He looks her up and down, grins, but walks on. “Mosby, up!” He commands.

Ted groans, having just adjusted his hamburger and beer, and protests. “No, Barney, I just sat down a minute ago.”

“Then you haven't been there long enough to be committed to—oh, wait—”

“Uncalled for,” Ted interjects.

Barney scoffs. “Hardly.”

“I don't know, Barney, there's that girl—” The woman now sitting across from the brunette starts.

“Doesn't count, Lily. Ted's equal part girl and moralist, apart from that thing with Victoria and Robin. It's hard to say whether his patience is because he's finally becoming a man or because he likes having a job, now—up, Mosby.”

“No way.” Ted turns to the brunette. “Robin?”

“Sorry, Mosby, you're going to have to move.”

“You are a traitor,” Ted says, but Robin just shrugs.

“Whatever. More moving, less pouting.”

Ted rolls his eyes, but slides his drink and burger to the perpendicular side of the table and stands. He turns to find an empty chair. “You both—” He sees her. “Missy!”

“She's Missy?” She hears Barney say. “Hot student high-five!”

 

 

Missy's mother tells Sheldon that if he doesn't visit her in New York by Christmas, it will break his memaw's heart. Unable to bear the burden of that threat, Sheldon begrudgingly packs his bags and flies to the city. His friends, fortunately including Penny, come along.

Her last class ends half an hour before their flight lands. It's Ted's class, and she'd like to tell him good bye, but it's been awkward since that night at the bar, and she'll be late if she doesn't leave immediately.

Penny, who sat next to Sheldon on both planes to New York, hugs her and demands to be taken to alcohol. Sheldon is indignant, but Leonard would follow Missy and Penny anywhere, Wolowitz relishes the opportunity to hit on women in new states, and Raj is unable to give his opinion one way or the other.

Against her better judgment, Missy brings them to McLaren's. She tips the bartender to dirty up all of her brother's drinks, then orders something strong for herself. As she's telling Penny about her classes, two of Ted's friends enter the bar. This time, Lily and the guy—his name is Marshall, Missy thinks—are arguing about whether Superman gets cold in space.

Sheldon, already a little tipsy, overhears and interjects his opinion immediately. He seems confident at first, but Marshall's knowledge of Superman comics is extensive, and Penny keeps passing Sheldon drinks until both he and Marshall are giggling over something that happened in the latest issue. Lily, meanwhile, is attempting to find both Howard and Raj girls. When Barney and Robin arrive, they join Lily's cause. Missy thinks it will take all their effort.

Their two groups are different, but have merged considerably well. Penny sits across from her, visibly relieved to have escaped her hellish cross-country flight, but watches the very bane of her airline travels with amusement and something like affection.

To Missy's surprise, both Howard and Raj do disappear with girls, and Lily, Robin, and Barney join them. Sheldon and Marshall have moved on to discussing _Star Trek_ , in its multitude of medias, and Penny comments about this character, and that episode, and a film or two along the way. When she does, Sheldon has this odd sort of smile, and Missy thinks she's either losing her mind or her brother's dormant hormones have been revived and he has a crush on her.

Well, better Leonard than Sheldon, she thinks. Anyway, Missy likes Penny, and she thinks she'd be a great sister-in-law. She sort of spaces out planning their wedding and attempting to imagine what sort of kids they'd have, so she's surprised when Ted pulls up a seat next to her. “Hey,” he says. “What's going on?”

She introduces him to Sheldon, Leonard, and Penny. “Our mother used emotional manipulation in the forms of our antiquated grandmother and the holiday season to convince him to spy on me,” she explains. “Now my brother is having philosophical conversations with Marshall about Spock and, I don't know, Han Solo or someone.” Okay, truthfully, Missy knows that Spock is _Star Trek_ and Han Solo is _Star Wars_ , but Sheldon's reaction to things like this never ceases to amuse her. She winks at Ted, then turns to Sheldon. “He's the captain right? Or is that that Mal guy?”

 

 

That night goes so well that all eleven of them meet at Ted and Robin's apartment the day after Christmas.

Lily immediately offers eggnog to Raj, having decided that he's adorable and she'd like to keep him. She and Robin ask him questions about astrophysics and occasionally make dirty puns that causes him to giggle. Barney devotes much of the night to Wolowitz, who he's evidently decided is in desperate need of his help.

The moment they enter the apartment, Marshall whisks Sheldon off to review his comic collection, which he evidently brought in three large plastic boxes, and it's well over an hour before Missy sees them again.

Meanwhile, Missy, Penny, and Ted watch TV and talk about how _It's a Wonderful Life_ is far from a wonderful movie. (This is a secret conversation that they are not allowed to mention to Marshall or Lily, because Ted assures them it would not go favorably.)

Sometime into the discussion, Sheldon and Marshall reemerge. Penny has wandered to the kitchen to fix for chips and dip, and Sheldon disappears there. “Ooh! _It's a Wonderful Life_! Isn't this the greatest movie ever?” Marshall doesn't wait for her response, just plops down on the floor in front of the TV. Missy can't see much of the movie from the point on, so it's a good thing her answer would have disappointed him.

Really, she doesn't mind at all, because Ted's next to her. He's warm, chuckling at Marshall's enthusiasm. She likes the way he laughs, and she's sitting close enough to him that their arms brush when he does. They watch Marshall watching the movie for a few minutes before Ted says, “Hey, do you want to go to the roof?”

“Sure,” she agrees. They grab their jackets. Ted pauses at his desk to grab a package wrapped in festive paper, then she follows him to the fire escape. They climb it slowly, because it's snowed while they've been there and is a little icy, but soon find themselves on the rooftop.

The snowfall is pretty heavy; the city is already blanketed in a layer of snow. The city, so diverse in its people and disjointed in streets and buildings, looks crisp and unified under the white of the snow. There are some great things in Texas, but Missy thinks there's probably nothing better than standing on a frozen rooftop with Ted Mosby.

“Is that for me?” She gestures toward the package with her head, her hands buried deep inside her pockets.

Ted considers the package, and Missy thinks he looks nervous. “Um, yeah,” he answers, like it's a confession. Her hands it to her. She tears the paper away and discovers it's a scrapbook. She opens it. Inside are pictures with labels and descriptions. They're all pictures of the inside of the buildings she photographed as a child. “They're all there,” Ted says. “I had to improvise with a few, but the general idea is there. I thought you should see them, even if it's better in person. I thought maybe you'd be inspired by some.”

“I love it.” She runs her fingertips along the cover. “Thank you.”

 “You're welcome.” He grins, takes a step toward her. “Look, Missy. I'm sure you've gathered from the jokes made at my expense that I have a history of moving too fast with things, wanting too much too soon. But I like you. A lot, actually, and I've tried to wait and let things happen on their own, but—”

“Ted.” Missy's heart is racing like a hundred miles an hour. She feels giddy, the way she often feels around Ted, and it reminds her of being fifteen and having her first boyfriend...but at the same time, so much more than that.

“Yeah?”

“I think you should maybe just shut up and kiss me.”

He does. As it turns out, there is something better than standing on a frozen rooftop with Ted Mosby.


End file.
